We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Joshua Huff a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Joshua, so good to have you with us today. We’ve always been impressed with folks who have a very clear sense of purpose and so maybe we can jump right in and talk about how you found your purpose?
From a young age, I always knew my purpose. Whether or not I fully acknowledged this innate understanding made no difference. As I developed as a young performing artist, athlete, and creative, all I saw were more opportunities to explore the vastness of reality and explore the relationships of self, other, and collective. No matter the outlet I chose, I always gravitated towards one particular theme — the collective. Whether it be by guiding individuals through holistic wellness programs and ancient mediation/movement arts, providing an atmosphere of vibrational ease through my music, or capturing the essence of precious moments through my lenses, my focus is always on the larger picture — or at least as large of a picture as I can see at that time. The more I developed my skillsets and utilized them to aid others, the more I heard the encrouaging push for fame and fortune. People say, “you better utilize your looks before you lose them” or “look at you! there’s no reason you should be working this job!”. Although I have had my experience performing, modeling, and pursuing that “center of attention” modality of thought, I have only pulled further from those suggestions. While fortune would be nice, I do not seek fame. I seek only the wealth of spirit through elevating myself and others. If I live my life a man of no material value but enhance the lives and spirits of those I come into contact with, then I have lived my life to its fullest potential and purpose.
My acknowledgment of this purpose only solidified as I traveled the west coast homeless. Not without aim, I was swept to wherever the wind called me. For about 12 months, I traveled from Los Angeles, California to Portland, Oregon with nothing but a backpack with my journals, bag full of clothes, and my guitar. Amidst these travels, I dug into the deepest parts of myself to heal and utilize the tools I have learned from my masters to overcome my traumas, epileptic seizures, and mental health issues. After much success and an entire album written, I returned to world of civilization to attempt implementing and sharing my experiences as to inspire and encourage others to do the uncomfortable. Leap into the unknown and live before it is time to die.
THAT is how I found my purpose.
Appreciate the insights and wisdom. Before we dig deeper and ask you about the skills that matter and more, maybe you can tell our readers about yourself?
Aside from my full-time income of working at a Homelessness Prevention Center, I engage in the various professional avenues listed below:
– Professional Modeling: since retied but held consistent positions and hirings for over 8 years.
– Professional Photography & Videography: DBA is Creative Services by Joshua Huff
– Professional Health and Fitness Coaching: Currently The Transformation Collective LLC with a forming DBA Brand called ZenLife 360 that is under development.
– Professional Performing Artist: solo vocalist with guitar and keyboard – cover artist and singer/songwriter
Through Creative Services by Joshua Huff, I embark on capturing the essence of precious moments through my lens. I tend to focus on landscapes, events, weddings, portraits, headshots, and modeling portfolio work.
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Through The Transformation Collective LLC, I develop educational group forums, pre-recording programs that are accessible anywhere, workshops and group classes. Due to slow and no business, the online forum is at bay and I am redeveloping the pre-recorded series for higher quality instructional content. This purpose of this company is to be a hub for all things health, wellness, and fitness.
Through ZenLife 360, I am going to focus the individualized and semi-private programming. This is a brand affiliated with The Transformation Collective LLC that is meant to centralize certain services and not overwhelm potential customers with the throwing all the options into one company.
My performing artist work is far and few in between without my Acoustic Movement special event. Acoustic Movement is a fusing of movement arts and performing arts. Due to the deeply spiritual nature of my music, the entire experience collaborates with the improved flow of meditative movement as instructed by my partner and fellow martial artist Joshua Craddock. I also maintain a yearly place as the performer for Howard County’s International Overdose Awareness event. Eventually, I will embark on recording my albums, but for now, I am working subtly and steadily until I am ready for that journey.
If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?
1) Tenacity and Resilience – I don’t care what anybody says, as long as I know in my heart that this is my purpose. People can tell me it’s not realistic and advise me to stay on a conventionally straight and narrow path, but it won’t matter. Because, for whatever reason, they gave up their dreams for convenience and comfortability (or never had such aspirations or the willingness to actualize their ideas and dreams). I refuse to live a life where I go on “making a living” to live to pay bills to work to do it all over again. I see people’s souls die out slowly as they embark against the grain of their natural rhythms. The soul is meant to be fulfilled through utilizing whatever passion resides within you. Your body is perfectly aligned to change with the natural and unnatural flows of your journey through this life. You MUST be resilient if you are to make it the end of anything you do. If you do not meet conflict and trials with resilience, you will find yourself failing only because you give up – not because you’re actually failing. Failing is only a result of quitting or giving up. You can step away to reflect on something and reconfigure your approaches if need be, but to quit is to abandon both resiliency and tenacity.
2) Grace and Forgiveness – alongside the power of tenacity must be the gentle stroke of grace. If you lack grace, you lack the ability to remain calm and steady. There are times that call for the strength of your anger and frustrations, but more often than not, situations call for grace and forgiveness. If you do not lead with this, then all you become is aggressively assertive, harsh, and hollowed in reasoning. To maintain grace and forgiveness is to maintain two of the most important virtues of life. Without forgiveness, you carry a hollowing heart. Without grace, you lack constraint and insight. Without these two at the forefront you do, you will experience more hardships than necessary – each situation that presents conflict will become increasingly difficult to handle and navigate. So, adopt these two modems of personality before you master anything else. And remember, grace and forgiveness is an inward practice just as much as it is an outward practice.
3) Curiosity and Efficiency – without a curious heart and mind, the body and spirit will deteriorate. However important it may be to be curious, one may also remain efficient when making decisions to pursue an interest. If you are curious but not efficient in your decision making, you will be the cat. If you can harvest efficiency while you fuel your curiosity, then you may very well master any arena you enter. With efficient curiosity, you can maneuver and adapt on the fly while you discover the insights brought to your by your curious exploration. If you are efficient but not curious, you will simply maintain your comfortability and rarely venture outside of the realm you are so settled into.
These are just three (technically 6) of the major characteristics/skills that I believe to be essential in developing as an overall human being.
Thanks so much for sharing all these insights with us today. Before we go, is there a book that’s played in important role in your development?
There are two books that have stood out to me the most amidst my reading:
1) The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho
2) The Kybalion by The Three Initiates
The Alchemist was the main book that accompanied me on my journey through California and Oregon. This story was about a lonely young man who traveled as a Shepard across dests, fields, and countless arenas of landscape. During the main characters journey, he falls in love, meets a shaman of sorts, and begins the existential art of Alchemy. Through his trials and tribulations, he transforms into a young man who harnesses the power of the wind and in the end, proves the vast capabilites of the human spirit.
The Kybalion is a collective piece of literature that reflects on and describes the ancient teachings of Hermes Trismegistus, the reported father of alchemy, metaphysical science, mythical psychology, and medicine. It breaks down the 7 principles that are listed here:
– 1) The Principle of Mentalism
– 2) The Principle of Correspondence
– 3) The Principle of Vibration
– 4) The Principle of Polarity
– 5) The Principle of Rhythm
– 6) The Principle of Cause and Effect
– 7) The Principle of Gender
While this book is not hundreds of pages of explanation, it is certainly “nutrient dense food” for the curious and open minds. It is an incredibly insightful sense to look through – I would recommend pairing this reading with the reading of Alan Watts, J. Krishnamurti and the like.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: @joshhuffofficial – @transformation.md – @creativeservicesbyjhuff
- Facebook: @wearetransformationco – @creativeservicesbyjhuff
- Youtube: @thetransformationco — @joshhuffofficial
